Windows into the Past

Life Histories and the Historian of South Asia

Judith M. Brown

Publication Year: 2009

Judith M. Brown, one of the leading historians of South Asia, provides an original and thought-provoking strategy for conducting and presenting historical research in her latest book, Windows into the Past. Brown looks at how varieties of “life history” that focus on the lives of institutions and families, as well as individuals, offer a broad and rich means of studying history. Her distinctively creative approach differs from traditional historical biography in that it explores a variety of “life histories” and shows us how they become invaluable windows into the past. Following her introduction, "The Practice of History,” Brown opens windows on the history of South Asia. She begins with the life history of an educational institution, Balliol College, Oxford, and tracks the interrelationship between Britain and India through the lives of the British and Indian men who were educated there. She then demonstrates the significance of family life history, showing that by observing patterns of family life over several generations, it is possible to gain insight into the experiences of groups of people who rarely left historical documents about themselves, particularly South Asian women. Finally, Brown uses the life history of two prominent individuals, Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru, to examine questions about the nature of Indian nationalism and the emergent Indian state.

Contents

Illustrations

Acknowledgments

Introduction: The Practice of History

This book is based on a series of lectures on the practice of history
given in the History Department at the University of Notre Dame in
2008. As a practitioner of imperial and global history, and, in particular,
of the history of South Asia and South Asians outside that subcontinent,
I found this invitation exciting and challenging...

Chapter 1: Colleges, Cohorts, and Dynasties

Our exploration of the potential of new kinds of “life history”
which are wider than studies of individuals begins with what I wish to
call rather loosely “colleges, cohorts, and dynasties.” I want to ask if
there are other kinds of “lives” apart from those of individuals which
the historian may fruitfully study as a source of evidence about the
past...

Chapter 2: Family Histories

The previous chapter examined aspects of the “life history” of a
particular Oxford college, to ask whether they could provide new
source material for the historian of South Asia. The personal and career
records of Balliol men who served in India demonstrated, among
many other things, considerable evidence about the significance of
British family traditions and connections in the creation of a professional
elite...

Chapter 3: Individual Lives and Their Public World

In the first two chapters I expanded the more usual understanding
of “life history,” beyond the life of an individual, to include the life of
key institutions and of families, as ways of doing history. I argued
that engaging with these different sorts of “lives” might open new
windows on to the recent South Asian past, though of course the
technique...

Chapter 4: Individual Lives and Their Inner World

The third and fourth chapters of this exploration into “life histories”
are concerned with the lives of prominent individual Indians,
particularly Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru, to see how this
genre may be a creative way of doing history rather distinct from the
art form of biography. In chapter 3 we examined how their life experiences
in Indian politics can open a window for historians...

Conclusion

The chapters in this volume have explored varieties of “life history”
as windows into the past, particularly the recent past of the subcontinent
of South Asia and its peoples. To change the metaphor, we have
asked whether life history can, at a time of considerable historiographical
flux and contestation, be a helpful door or entry point into
the historical study...

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